1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a fixture for a circuit board, and more particularly, to a fixture for clamping and fixing the circuit board in place.
2. Description of Related Art
A plurality of expandable interface cards, such as Small Computer System Interface (SCSI), Peripheral Component Interface (PCI), Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP) and so on, are used in computer. In this regard, an interface card is a circuit board having a plurality of electronic components for connection with peripheral devices of the computer. However, a metal plate must be fixed on the interface card so as to lock the plate on a casing of the computer while plugging the interface card to an expanded slot of a main board.
FIG. 1 is a three-dimensional view showing a fixture 13 for fixing a plate element 11 on a circuit board 12 in the prior art. The fixture 13 comprises a first supporting board 131 for supporting the circuit board 12, and a second supporting board 132 for supporting the plate element 11, wherein a clamping space 133 with a fixed size is formed between the second supporting board 132 and the first supporting board 131, and at least one positioning bump 132a is disposed on the second supporting board 132. The circuit board 12 lies on the first supporting board 131 in the clamping space 133, such that the circuit board 12 is positioned in the clamping space 133 of the fixture 13. The plate element 11 has at least one opening 11a corresponding to the positioning bump 132a of the second supporting board 132. The opening 11a positions the plate element 11 on the second supporting board 132. The plate element 11 further comprises at least one fixing hole 11b. The circuit board 12 comprises at least one positioning hole 12a corresponding to the fixing hole 11b, such that a screw 14 is passed through the fixing hole 11b and screwed into the positioning hole 12a so as to fix the plate element 11 to the circuit board 12.
However, the width w of the clamping space 133 is based on fixed dimensions and therefore invariable, that is to say, the width of the first supporting board 131 is designed according to the width of the circuit board (i.e. interface card), thus a fixture of certain dimensions is dedicated to a certain type of interface cards. As there are a wide variety of interface cards which differ from each other in dimensions, the drawbacks of manufacturing a fixture for use with circuit boards of certain dimensions are as follows:
First, different types of interface cards mean different widths of the circuit board 12; since the width w of the first supporting board 131 is designed according to the width of the circuit board 12, the fixture cannot be applied to other circuit boards having dimensions other than the above-mentioned. In other words, one type of fixtures is only applicable to one type of interface cards. A new fixture must be manufactured in response to the advent of a new interface card, which requires enormous manpower, material and money and therefore increases manufacturing costs.
Second, as science and technology evolve, the types of interface cards are ever-increasing, so are the types of fixtures. Thus more and more space is required to store fixtures. Besides, storage and classified management of a wide variety of fixtures are never easy.
Accordingly, the problem to be solved here is to provide a fixture characterized by flexible use, short manufacturing time, a low manufacturing cost, a high space utilization rate, and ease of storage and management.